U.S. PIRG Fidget Spinners 111417

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Darden Restaurants, the nation’s largest restaurant company and owner of Olive Garden, is facing pressure from investors today at its annual shareholder meeting to eliminate the routine use of antibiotics in its supply chain, a practice that can fuel the spread of drug resistant bacteria.

On Tuesday, the Senate failed to pass a short-term budget bill to keep the government running due to opposition over a secret-money rider and a lack of federal funding to address the Flint water crisis. The proposed secret-money rider would prohibit the SEC from strengthening corporate disclosure laws by requiring transparency of secret political spending.

On Monday, 37 organizations signed an open letter to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, urging McConnell to reject any poison pill language in budget legislation that would prohibit the Securities and Exchange Commission from strengthening corporate disclosure laws by requiring transparency of secret political spending. A proposed secret-money rider is a sticking point in Senate budget negotiations, as lawmakers debate a continuing resolution which must pass by the end of September to keep the government open.

Last week, we were in New York City, where the United Nations General Assembly spent an entire day discussing antibiotic resistance, “the biggest threat to modern medicine.” Experts estimate that more than 700,000 people worldwide die from antibiotic-resistant infections each year, including 23,000 in the United States—a number that could grow to 10 million globally by 2050.

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Senator Coburn publishes a guide to American taxation that describes how Congress and federal agencies should prevent corporations accused of wrongdoing from writing off their out-of-court settlements as a tax deduction.

U.S. PIRG urged the Senate to reject the House’s proposed one-year retroactive tax extender package, which would add approximately $45 billion to the federal deficit, while overwhelmingly catering to special interests and failing to prioritize public benefits

Washington, D.C. – The U.S. Public Interest Research Group today submitted comments to a ruling issued by The Department of Treasury on corporate inversions. The guidance, released in September, laid out a number of reforms to curb inversions including regulations on “hopscotch” loans and “de-controlling” strategies.

Dangerous or toxic toys can still be found on America’s store shelves, according to our 29th annual Trouble in Toyland report. The report reveals the results of laboratory testing on toys for toxic chemicals, including lead, chromium and phthalates, all of which can have serious, adverse health impacts on a child’s development. The survey also found examples of small toys that pose a choking hazard, extremely loud toys that threaten children’s hearing, and powerful toy magnets that can cause serious injury if swallowed.

The six banks that today announced out-of-court settlements with federal agencies to atone for manipulating foreign exchange markets won't be able to write off those payments as a tax-deductible business expense. Why isn't that always the case?

(UPDATED): The CFPB, which turns one on Saturday, is coming of age with the announcement of its first enforcement action, against Capital One Bank, for deceptive marketing of junky payment protection and credit monitoring products to cardholders. Capital One will pay over $200 million in direct restitution and civil penalties.

Recently we have all seen or heard about the food scares that have transpired from eating egg salad, spinach and cantaloupe. In fact, the cantaloupe foodborne illness outbreak was one of the worst the U.S. has seen in over 25 years. This Listeria outbreak linked to Colorado grown cantaloupes led to over 29 deaths, with over 139 people infected across 28 states.

Today, as expected, the CFPB announced its first "larger participants" rule, giving itself the authority to supervise, or look inside the mysterious "black box" operations, of the biggest credit bureaus. This is a really big deal for consumers who've suffered through the mistakes made by these gatekeepers to financial and employment opportunity.

A reported $5 billion settlement over anti-competitive practices by Visa and Mastercard that raise prices for all consumers at the store and at the pump will allow merchants to surcharge credit card transactions in some circumstances. But the convenience stores oppose the settlement as too weak to protect them.

The CFPB travels to Detroit Monday, July 16th, for a field hearing on credit reporting. It seems like a fine opportunity to announce a final anticipated rule giving it full authority -"guns, lots of guns" - to look inside the black box operations of Trans Union, Equifax and Experian-- the Big Three self-anointed and little-scrutinized gatekeepers to financial and employment opportunity despite their long record of mistakes and failure to give consumers a chance to fix them.